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Unit 2Chemical WeaponsChapter 1: Introduction
All chapters
  1. 1. Introduction
  2. 2. The History of Chemical Warfare
  3. 3. Evolution of the Norm against Chemical Weapons
  4. 4. Current Challenges Posed by Chemical Weapons
  5. 5. The EU and Chemical Weapons
  6. 6. Summary and Further Reading
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Chapter 1

Introduction

Chemical Weapons

The video lecture covers the following topics:

  • definition of
  • military utility of
  • relationship between offence and defence
  • major classes

Chemical Warfare is…

… the intentional application for hostile purposes of toxic substances against humans and their environment.

Operation Ranch Hand: Spraying Agent Orange to deny the enemy jungle cover during the Viêt-Nam war in the 1960s.

National Museum of the U.S. Air Force, Public domain.
  • Toxic substances – poisons (G) – interfere with the life processes, thereby causing temporary or permanent damage to a living organism or killing it all together.
  • In warfare, humans are the primary target of armed action. However, besides anti-personnel chemical weapons, toxic warfare agents (G) can also be directed against animals and plants.

Chemical Weapons are Together or Separately

1. The toxic agent

The is the poisonous substance that may cause harm to living organisms.

There exists a wide range of toxic chemicals, which may exist in nature or are synthesised in laboratories or manufactured in chemical plants.

However, not all toxic chemicals are suited for warfare. Warfare agents represent a compromise between different factors, including: ease of production, long-term storage, stability after release, and desired impact on the target.

Agents used for warfare purposes came as

gases (e.g., chlorine) liquids (e.g., sarin or mustard agent) solids (e.g., CS lachrymator)

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2. The delivery system

Chemical warfare (G) agents can be applied in several ways, such as pouring the poisonous substance in a water container or delivery on the battlefield during an artillery barrage. However sophisticated or primitive the CW programme, always a means will be required to deliver an agent onto the target.

Among the possibilities are:

  • missile warheads, bombs
  • shells, grenades
  • aerosol generators, spray tanks

But the technology may also be simple:

  • plastic bags (Tokyo, 1995)
  • barrel bombs (Syria)
  • lorries in suicide attacks (Iraq and Syria)

3. Any specific equipment required to enable chemical warfare

While the toxic agent and the delivery system are the CW components that readily come to mind, different types of specifically designed equipment are needed in connection with the use of the munitions and devices mentioned in the box to the left.

These may include:

  • various types of installations to fill munitions with agent
  • tools to calibrate certain types of equipment
  • equipment for testing the agent quality
  • and so on

CW and other Non-Conventional Weapons

PRIF, CC BY 4.0.

The definition of chemical weapons in the previous slide suggests a clear and distinct arms category. Such sharp delineation is necessary to effectively implement a treaty such as the Chemical Weapons Convention (G).

In reality the boundaries are fuzzy. Biological weapons comprise replicable microbial organisms that cause disease in humans, animals and plants. However, between CW and BW are toxins (G) – poisons produced by living organisms – and bioactive molecules, sub-cellular particles that help to regulate an organism’s life processes. Research into the latter forms a key part in the development of novel incapacitating agents.

Blast and heat are the principal destructive forces of nuclear weapons. However, they result from the energy released by fission or fusion reactions. Radiation is a 3rd product of the nuclear reaction. Radiation poisons living organisms. Radiological weapons specifically seek to exploit the latter characteristic. However, the poisoning is not the result of the direct toxic action of the agent, as is the case with CW.

Types of Chemical Warfare Agents – 1

Blood agents

  • World War 1 vintage
  • Usually no longer considered useful as CW (G).
  • Most of the blood agents are based on arsenicals or cyanides.
  • Usually inhaled, they are highly poisonous and fast-acting.
  • They prevent the transportation of oxygen to other parts of the body.
  • They are volatile and therefore difficult to use as a warfare agent in open spaces.
  • Cyanogen chloride
  • Hydrogen cyanide

Choking or pulmonary agents

  • World War 1 vintage
  • Usually no longer considered useful as CW (G).
  • However, re-emerged in Syrian civil war.
  • Pulmonary agents impede breathing through damage to the respiratory tract and lungs.
  • Death follows through the build-up of fluids in the lungs.
  • Unless a victim is caught in a very high concentration, death follows after one or more days. Survivors suffer lifelong systemic damage.
  • Volatile, but gases are heavier than air.
  • Chlorine
  • Diphenylcyanoarsine (Clark 2)
  • Diphosgene
  • Phosgene

Nerve agents

  • First discovered in late 1930s while researching novel pesticides.
  • Most toxic of standardised warfare (G) agents
  • Organophosphorus agents that disrupt the central nervous system by blocking the enzyme acetylcholinesterase and thus preventing the breakdown of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine.
  • Can penetrate clothing and be absorbed through the skin, thus requiring full body protection. Antidotes are available.
  • Highly poisonous and fast-acting liquids: a single drop may cause death within hours
  • May be volatile (Sarin) or highly persistent (Soman, VX).
  • Cyclosarin
  • Sarin
  • Soman
  • Tabun
  • VX
  • Novichok agents (Novel Soviet family of nerve agents)

Vesicants or blister agents

  • World War 1 vintage
  • Still considered a standard CW (G) category.
  • Small-scale use by ISIL in 2015 confirmed in Iraq and Syria
  • Produces chemical burns leading to blisters on exposed body parts.
  • Unless inhaled, exposure is not usually fatal, but recovery is lengthy, painful and requires intensive nursing. Infection of open blisters may be fatal.
  • Oily liquid that may persist for weeks. Can penetrate clothing, thus requiring full body protection.
  • Nitrogen mustard agents
  • Sulphur mustard agents
  • Lewisite (arsenical)
  • Phosgene oxime (usually listed in this category, although it produces serious skin irritation rather than blistering)

Incapacitating agents

  • No longer considered useful on battlefields.
  • Interest in novel incapacitants persists in the context of hostage crises and counter-terrorism operations.
  • Incapacitants affect the central nervous system and introduce temporary physical disability or mental disorientation.
  • Effects persist for hours or days after end of exposure to agent.
  • Intended as a non-lethal weapon, the differentiation between an incapacitating and lethal dose is too small. Their large-scale application may therefore produce many fatalities.
  • BZ (3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate)
  • LSD (Lysergic acid diethylamide )
  • Carfentanyl and other opioids
  • Scopolamine

Irritating agents

  • Currently primarily used for law enforcement, riot control and crowd control purposes.
  • Prohibited for warfare purposes, but otherwise only limited regulation.
  • In contrast to incapacitants, effects of irritating or harassing agents usually disappear soon after as exposure ends.
  • Three main categories: Lachrymators (tear agents), Malodorants (stink agents) and Vomiting agents.
  • Vomiting agents were used in World War 1 as they were able to penetrate gas masks then in use. They were intended to force soldiers to unmask during a CW attack
  • CN (Mace)
  • CS (principal riot control agent today)
  • Oleoresin capsicum (Pepper spray)
  • XM1063 (USA), Skunk (Israel)
  • Adamsite, Diphenylchloroarsine and Diphenylcyanoarsine (WW1 vomiting agents)

Anti-plant agents

  • Research into anti-plant agents began in World War 2. Its initial purpose was to destroy enemy agricultural produce.
  • The UK introduced herbicidal warfare during the Malayan uprising (1948 – 60).
  • The USA used such agents extensively as part of Operation Ranch Hand in South-East Asia (1962 – 71).
  • Herbicides and anti-crop chemicals
  • Soil-sterilant anti-plant agents
  • Many former anti-plant agents were in agricultural use, but were applied in far higher concentrations during war-time operations
  • Agent Orange and related compounds had high dioxin concentrations, which contributed to high incident rates of genetic defects among offspring of exposed victims
  • Agent Orange (and other so-called Rainbow herbicides, named after the colour codes: Agents Blue, Purple, White, etc.)
  • Ammonium thiocyanate (intended against Japanese rice crops in WW2)
  • Bromacil
  • Monuron

Toxin agents

  • Poison (G) agents produced by living organisms (animals, plants, microbes, fungi, etc.).
  • Occupy a zone between chemical and biological warfare agents.
  • May also be produced synthetically.
  • Although highly poisonous, toxins (G) are difficult to manufacture in large quantities
  • They have been applied in assassination plots (e.g., Operation Anthropoid killing Reinhard Heydrich in 1942; murder of Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov in London in 1978).
  • Today toxins are agents of concern in particularly lone-actor terrorism or crime.
  • Abrin
  • Botulinum toxins
  • Ricin
  • Saxitoxin
  • Staphyloccocal enterotoxin B
  • Tetrodotoxin
  • Trichothecene mycotoxins (so-called Yellow Rain)

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